Ok so now I have to put my reading into high-gear! Why you ask? Well after briefly reading The Big Thrill on-line magazine I discovered that there will be new releases from four of my favorite authors in March,.Here’s a little about those new releases…..
For those of us who like me, were lucky enough to have a high draft number, (mine was 306), and escaped the war in Vietnam, Tim O’Brien has shown us slices of life in it, in his novel The Things They Carried. And it’s everything that we thought it was, everything that we protested to end.
Cross-Posted from Book-Ed
As the month comes to an end it’s time for a reading recap and update. Yesterday I finished reading Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried which is the fourth book I’ve finished in February. Previously I finished The Promise of a Pencil, Throne of Glass and Revelation Space. The Things They Carried had been on my TBR pile so it counts toward my goal on the TBR Pile Challenge and since it is about the Vietnam War it counts toward the 2015 Historical Fiction Challenge. Here is a current update on my Reading Challenges…..
The other day I decided to get a little more organized in both my reading and music listening, I decided what I will do is to try to set aside an hour a day to read and listen to music together. The music genres that I prefer to listen to if I am reading are: new age, jazz, classical or progressive rock.I figured I will create a 60 minute playlists containing a few tracks from several artists, that I am unfamiliar with, in whatever genre I pick. My first music and reading hour was last Friday and the genre that I chose was jazz. To start, I reviewed the JazzWeek Charts and found five artists that I was unfamiliar with, which was not hard at all. Then I went to Spotify, to create the playlist.
So I had to take books back to the library yesterday. both mine and my daughter Elizabeth’s. On the way I said to myself…”.You are not getting any books out of they library, you are already reading four or five books!” My response was fine, “well, how about if I only get out a book if I find something by somebody whose work I really love. like say Alex Kava!” I said this thinking I was safe because I know that Alex Kava’s books usually come out in the summer!!
Tonight I started thinking about books that I’ve read, and decided to look at my Goodreads Bookshelf to see what books I finished in February of 1995, 20 years ago,yeah right! On February 04, 1995, I finished Liar’s Poker:A Harry Garnish Mystery from Frank McConnell, the 21st I finished Vince Kohler’s Banjo Boy and on the 25th, I finished Shackles a Nameless Detective Mystery by Bill Pronzini. Of the three Shackles was my probably my favorite. While I don’t remember all of the details I do remember that it was a great read! In fact the book was nominated for an Anthony Award for Best Novel (It lost to Thomas Harris; Silence of the Lambs, tough competition!
So as I was coming to the end of Alastair Reynold’s Revelation Space when I thought to myself; which character am I rooting for?? I image that it’s supposed to be Dan Sylveste, who throughout the book has been obsessed with the Amarantin civilization. A civilization that was destroyed 900,000 years ago! Sylveste has spent a lifetime on Resurgam trying to uncover what happened to the Amarantin civilization. From what he has uncovered it appeared that The Event that destroyed their civilization occurred shortly after the civilization had achieved space flight!
So the question is: Can a 63 year-old grandfather love a book that features an eighteen year-old kick-ass female protagonist? The answer is a resounding hell yes!! The book is Throne of Glass and the heroine is Celaena Sardothian the Adarlan Assassin who has been captured and sent to a slave labor camp. Celaena has amazingly survived 1 and 1/2 years in the Endovier Salt Mines, when the story begins. The novel opens when Crown Prince Dorian Havillliard of Adarlan visits and makes Celaena and offer she can’t refuse return with him to Rifchold and be his champion in a competition to be his father, the King’s Champion! If she wins and serves the King for four years, she will be set free. Soon Celaena is on her way to join a competition against twenty-three killers, thieves and warriors to become the King’s Champion and ultimately be set free.
